A clever, entertaining fusion of world mythologies and the Old West.
In Hollister’s fantasy novel, humans and gods living together in the afterlife must determine what’s threatening their planet.
Everyone who dies on Earth winds up on Hades, a planet accessible via wormhole. It’s a lot like Earth—there’s plentiful ocean water, but the world has centuries-old technology. Melissa MacDonald lives there with her dockmaster father; they both died from cholera at nearly the same time in 1918. Her dream of attending the prestigious University of Hades comes true with some assistance from the MacDonalds’ friend John Shaw, who captains the steamboat Queen of the Styx. Melissa’s forte is painting, but at the university, she sets her eyes on a new department: the Interspecies Group. Like many others, Melissa wants to know what’s been causing major seismic events, which are unprecedented on Hades. The goal of this newly formed group is to communicate with the planet’s rarely seen dolphins, since the recent tidal waves and quakes have affected both land and sea. To identify the source of the problem and rectify it, Melissa will need help from Captain Shaw and the Queen. Her plan may also require working with the Old Ones, gods who don’t necessarily get along with humans. Meanwhile, Vincent, who was an upscale art thief on Earth, maintains his life of crime on Hades despite the use of severe punishment for lawbreakers. When his latest robbery goes awry, he makes a bold move that could very well cost him his freedom. His path ultimately intersects with the Queen as it chugs down the River Styx, and Melissa discovers an ability that may change everything.
Hollister packs much exposition into this deliberately paced novel. The setting often feels like the American frontier; electricity is limited, and steam-powered trains deliver handwritten letters. Humans look the age they were when they died, so Melissa appears as an 18-year-old while actually clocking in at over a century. (People tend to forget their earthly lives, thanks to the effects of the Lethe River.) Along with the arresting backdrop, the author offers absorbing character development, from backstories for Shaw and Vincent to the dolphins’ perspective as they debate contacting the “air-breathing bipeds.” Hades is an unexpectedly welcoming place with such familiar sights as Earth-inspired architecture (Roman, Mesopotamian, Egyptian) and no sign of the illnesses or disabilities that affect people on Earth. Mt. Olympus, where the Old Ones reside, is a curious blend of deities, including Zeus, Yahweh, Thoth, and many more. Melissa is instantly likable; she’s smart, easygoing, and a hard worker who earns her steamboat passage to the university by becoming a cook’s assistant. Although Vincent is an unabashed criminal, readers may be hard-pressed to call him a villain. His storyline is more a series of misadventures (like his escape from incarceration), and he has an unorthodox way of robbing people. Once the final act rolls around, it’s not hard to see where the story is headed; still, the ending satisfies, providing resolution for the planet and its manifold residents.
A clever, entertaining fusion of world mythologies and the Old West.Pub Date: March 15, 2026
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 252
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: Dec. 31, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
An author to watch, Buehlman is now two for two in delivering eerie, offbeat novels with admirable literary skill.
Cormac McCarthy's The Road meets Chaucer's Canterbury Tales in this frightful medieval epic about an orphan girl with visionary powers in plague-devastated France.
The year is 1348. The conflict between France and England is nothing compared to the all-out war building between good angels and fallen ones for control of heaven (though a scene in which soldiers are massacred by a rainbow of arrows is pretty horrific). Among mortals, only the girl, Delphine, knows of the cataclysm to come. Angels speak to her, issuing warnings—and a command to run. A pack of thieves is about to carry her off and rape her when she is saved by a disgraced knight, Thomas, with whom she teams on a march across the parched landscape. Survivors desperate for food have made donkey a delicacy and don't mind eating human flesh. The few healthy people left lock themselves in, not wanting to risk contact with strangers, no matter how dire the strangers' needs. To venture out at night is suicidal: Horrific forces swirl about, ravaging living forms. Lethal black clouds, tentacled water creatures and assorted monsters are comfortable in the daylight hours as well. The knight and a third fellow journeyer, a priest, have difficulty believing Delphine's visions are real, but with oblivion lurking in every shadow, they don't have any choice but to trust her. The question becomes, can she trust herself? Buehlman, who drew upon his love of Fitzgerald and Hemingway in his acclaimed Southern horror novel, Those Across the River (2011), slips effortlessly into a different kind of literary sensibility, one that doesn't scrimp on earthy humor and lyrical writing in the face of unspeakable horrors. The power of suggestion is the author's strong suit, along with first-rate storytelling talent.
An author to watch, Buehlman is now two for two in delivering eerie, offbeat novels with admirable literary skill.Pub Date: Oct. 2, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-937007-86-7
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Ace/Berkley
Review Posted Online: Sept. 1, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2012
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